End Water Poverty is the international campaign that aims to bring an end to the global water and sanitation crisis.
We are formed of organisations from around the world, demanding urgent action and leadership from donors and governments alike.
Only together, with one voice, can we tackle this devastating crisis that affects billions of poor people across the world.
Read our blog for the latest news on water and sanitation advocacy and join us on www.endwaterpoverty.org too.

Thursday, 21 February 2013

A
month tomorrow, on World Water Day, 22 March 2013, hundreds of thousands of people
across the world will join together and take action to call for an end to the
water and sanitation crisis.To
mark this, the World Water and Sanitation campaign have released a film to call
on people everywhere to join this global movement for change.

Over
170,000 people are already planning walks in 25 countries from Bangladesh to
Belgium, Nigeria to Nepal and Colombia to Cameroon. They are walking in
solidarity with the millions of people – overwhelmingly women and children - who
walk great distances each day to collect water for their basic needs and the
billions who have no safe place to go to the toilet.They’ll
be calling on politicians across the globe to keep the promises they have made
to get water and sanitation to the world’s poorest countries and communities.
Politicians have made commitments at local, national, regional and global
levels to end this crisis but many of these promises are not being kept, so now
is the time to demand action.The
World Walks for Water and Sanitation is calling on people across the world to
join in with the 170,000 campaigners already walking to call for change and get
their voices heard.

Walking across the world

Details
of some of the events already being planned include:

In Sierra Leone, over 2,500
people will be taking part in walks across the country, including in
Freetown. The Minister for the recently established Ministry for Water
Resources, Hon. Momodu Elongima Maligie, has been invited to attend.

In Belgium almost 20,000 school
children will be walking a collective distance of over 100,000 Km.

Over 10,000 people in Pakistan
and over 20,000 people in India will be walking.

Liberia CSOs WASH Network is
planning a three day sit-in and petition action at the Ministries of
Health, Lands and Mines and Public Works. They’re planning to collect
15,000 signatures calling for promises to be kept.

A crucial campaign

Natasha Horsfield, a
coordinator of the World Walks for Water and Sanitation campaign added, “We welcome all of the promises that
politicians have made to end the water and sanitation crisis but we want to
remind them that words are not enough! We
want to see these promises turned into action. It’s time to tell world leaders
that it’s not acceptable for 2,000 children to be dying every day because they
don’t have clean drinking water or a safe place to go to the toilet.”

Join the World Walks for Water and Sanitation!

We're calling on people across the world to join the thousands of campaigners walking to demand political leaders keep their promises on sanitation and water this World Water Day. Organise your own walk or join one near you. Find out more and register at www.worldwalksforwater.org

Walkers are calling on governments take action to end the water and sanitation crisis which kills almost 2,000 children every single day. Politicians across the world have made promises to ensure that the world's poorest countries and communities gain access to safe water and sanitation - but many of these promises are not being kept. So, this year, campaigners are telling these politicians that words are not enough and that real action is needed.

This is a great opportunity for you to make your voices heard on an incredibly important issue, so if you haven’t already signed up visit http://www.worldwalksforwater.org/eng to find out more.

We have created some fantastic tools for you to use when planning your walks, including a fantastic poster, which you can find in the Resources section of our site. We also have a new widget which you can place on your own website to tell your supporters and partners about the campaign event and encourage them to organise their own walks.

So, sign up now and join us to make the World Walks for Water and Sanitation 2013 the biggest yet!

Friday, 8 February 2013

Willice
Onyango is chairperson of the International Youth Council. End Water Poverty supported him to attend the second High Level Panel meeting in Monrovia at the end of January. Here, he blogs about his experience:The third meeting of the High
Level Panel of Eminent Persons took place in
Monrovia between all members of the High Level Panel and seventy CSO representatives. The
meeting took the format of a "town hall" event, where CSO members
together with grassroots representatives shared evidence, perspectives, and
recommendations on the topic of National Building Blocks for Sustained
Prosperity and its sub-themes. This served as a framing conversation, also
giving critical clarity to the vision and aspirations of ordinary citizens for
the future.

This meeting has happened against backdrop
of several youth consultations round the world since the second High Level Panel meeting in London. Two fundamental principles that underpinned the Youth
Outreach High Level Panel meeting in London were inclusion
ofyoung people who have the agency to be the banner carriers of the new
agenda and innovationthatbrings nuanced perspectives, fresh solutions
and insights to persistent national and global challenges.There have been country youth consultations, online engagement,
National Dialogues, Beyond 2015 Children and Youth Working Group and online discussions on addressing
inequalities faced by children and young people on worldwewant2015.org.

As noted by Prof. Gita Sen during the CSO pre-consultative forum, the post 2015
agenda should give special attention to the most vulnerable people, in particular
children, the youth and adolescents. The need for an inclusive framework where
social inclusion and zero discrimination are key words can’t be over-emphasised. But even focusing on vulnerabilities is crucially
unfair. We need to look
at people's ability more than their disability ifthe post 2015
framework is to make a difference. People must be considered in the light of
their potential more than seeing them as a burden.

The HLP have to not only hear the voices of the voiceless but clearly articulate them in
their recommendations to be presented in April to the UN
Secretary General.

As
the largest demographic bar none, young people will be the difference between success and failure of any global commitments
made and it is incumbent upon the HLP to gather evidence from grassroots youth to frame, articulate and deliberate on a
clear vision for the future that is informed by our needs and aspirations. They should consult with youth to articulate and agree on key pillars of economic transformation, highlighting
national building blocks for sustained wealth that provide us with the capacity to function. And they should create a specific platform to voice our perspectives.

Children and Youths visioning of post-2015

The HLP needs to consider developing a framework that addresses structural
child poverty in various contexts and enables good governance and
accountability around child rights and protection. In order for children
to participate in the economic transformation, the new framework must prioritize
initiatives that promote quality education, health care, reproductive health,
information, adequate nutrition, appropriate services for children living with
disabilities and must ensure that national governments provide budgetary
allocations and are held accountable for the protection of children from all
forms of violation and exploitation. The post-2015 agenda should consider access
to safe water, improved sanitation and hygiene (WASH) as basic human rights that underpin health,
education and livelihoods. The problems associated with lack of access to WASH
impact on virtually all aspects of human development, disproportionately
affecting the life chances of young people.

Youth unemployment considerably exacerbates the danger of major structural
unemployment for many years to come. Unemployment is a huge inefficiency to
both young people and to international society looked at in light of costs to governments,
non state actors and lost potential wages. Youth as a dispossessed constituency is a threat to
sustainable economy leading to a trigger for rising crime and social malfunction.
There exists massive disparity of access between young women and adolescent
girls for productive resources and prosperity.

Holistic international youth policies with
national focus must therefore be founded on:

- The provision of more and better
education, including formal education, informal education and vocational
trainings; active and dignified insertion of youth in the workplace ensuring
them a good wage and jobs as part of a career path, as well as liberty, gender
equality, and security; the provision of career centers, knowledge exchanging
facilities among youth nationally and internationally by the establishment of
youth workers union and social dialogue
to facilitate a successful matching of labour demand and supply, to ensure
successful programming and to foster youth hiring.

“Without young people’s ideas we the
Panel would be missing the best hope for a successful set of goals. Bring us your ideas.” Graca Machel HLP
November 2012

Post MDGS should give power tochildren and youthto Become Agents of Change

The post 2015 agenda
must address the causes of structural and cyclical poverty among children
in various contexts; good governance and accountability around child rights and
protection; and enabling children to participate in economic transformation
through initiatives that promote equal education
forgirlsandboys,
healthcare, sexual health, information,adequate nutrition, and
services for children including those with disabilities or HIV,and protection of
children from all forms of violence and exploitation including earlyand forced marriage.

Lastly, but by no means
least, the framework must realize the potential of the demographic dividend through comprehensive youth policies
that include provision of more and better education, support for young people
to obtain decent and well/paid jobs, access to finance and knowledge to become
innovators and entrepreneurs, as well as
the ability of all young people, especially adolescents, to obtain comprehensive sex education, and sexual and reproductive services,
and to empower and resource girls to prevent teenage pregnancies and
violence.

If every voice truly
counts then the voice of children and
youth has to be heard in the development of the next set of global goals.

Wednesday, 30 January 2013

Prince Kreplah is the Chairman of the Liberia CSOs WASH Network. He is representing End Water Poverty at the second High Level Panel meeting on the post-2015 development agenda in Monrovia, Liberia. Here, he talks about his experience so far:

As the Post 2015 UN High Level Panel meeting is set to take off today, Monday 28 January, Africa wide, global and Liberian CSOs have convened in Monrovia to agree and promote the civil society vision for the world.

The civil society vision will be presented to the High Level Panel on 30th
January 2012. WASH civil society is very visible within these pre-meetings and and the great news is the Minister of Gender and Development of Liberia
has added her voice to the call for the civil society vision to consider water
and sanitation as a critical development issue that must be prioritsed by
global leaders.

The Liberia CSOs WASH Network is privileged to be represented
by the National Chairman of the Liberia NGOs Network, John Jucon, and Prince
Kreplah, Chairman of the CSOs WASH Network. These two representatives are working in collaboration with the
WaterAid team and are focusing on amplifying WASH issues and lobbying
other civil society colleagues to ensure the visibility of WASH in the civil
society vision.

Tuesday, 15 January 2013

The World Walks for Water and Sanitation Widget is now available! Its a great way to promote the campaign and to get others registering to walk or signing up to join the walk online. You can use it to create an easy link from your website or blog to the World Walks for Water and Sanitation 2013 website, including the walk registration form and Keep Your Promises page!

Just paste the link from the World Walks for Water and Sanitation resources page into your website and anyone who visits your page will be able to find out more about the World Walks for Water and Sanitation in one easy click.http://www.worldwalksforwater.org/eng/pages/resources

Don't forget to share the link with your contacts so we can make sure as many people as possible hear about the campaign and sign up! This year's World Walks for Water will be holding leaders to account on their WASH commitments and calling on them to keep their promises to improve access to clean water and sanitation. Help us make sure these promises are not left off track and unfulfilled by spreading the word to get even more people than last year joining the World Walks for Water and Sanitation 2013!

Friday, 4 January 2013

Claire Beck is a
child health and nutrition specialist who has been working with World Vision
for 11 years. With a strong background of emergency programme management in a
variety of sectors, she is currently global team leader for health, nutrition
and WASH in humanitarian emergencies.

The importance of having a private place to go to the
toilet or wash yourself is a pretty basic instinct for all human beings. Have
you ever thought what it would be like not to have this? Even in the poorest
and most under-resourced communities there are systems in place that aim for
sanitary practices and allow some dignity to remain for what every human being
must do every day.

In my role as a health specialist for emergency situations
I often experience conditions that deny people of this basic dignity. It’s hard
to imagine unless you’ve experienced it. Maybe if you’ve been camping for a few
days you’ve coped with digging a hole or washing in a stream, but doing this
for weeks or even months, while forced to live in cramped and crowded
conditions, is a very different scenario.

Enclosed latrines and clean water supply are often
used as measures to calculate development, and so the vulnerability of this
infrastructure to disasters, both natural and human induced, should also be
part of the calculation. Even when there are sanitation facilities available
they quickly become dirty and unhygienic as lots of people use them. They can
also be unsafe to use due to bad construction, poor location, the wrong type
for the situation or a lack of locks and screening. As a result people will
stop using them – especially women and children – and they may as well not be
there at all.

Given poor sanitation and limited water for washing in
these emergency conditions, I am always on the lookout for rapid outbreaks of
diarrhea, skin diseases, increased malaria and dengue fevers, even pneumonia,
all of which could be prevented if the displaced communities had access to
enough clean water, adequate sanitation facilities, disinfectant, soap and better
messaging on how these diseases are spread.

It’s not only the displaced that face this problem in
emergency situations. Earlier this year I attended an emergency response based
on famine and food insecurity in Niger, where the rate of latrine usage is
among the lowest in the world. We noted an alarming increase in cholera in some
of the areas near the massive Niger River and could only put it down to the
toilet habits of local communities. So we introduced crisis sanitation into the
programme, working with the community health workers to identify causes and ensuring
that every household had access to enough soap for their family to ensure hand
washing at the critical times and water purification sachets so they could
purify their water at home. In addition village committees turned their
attention to the state of public toilets and began to take responsibility for
disinfecting them daily.

What the residents really wanted long-term were
latrines at household level. Given the threat of a further cholera outbreak,
this seemed a reasonable request and I am pleased to report that work towards
that goal was ongoing when I left. In fact, I would like to see household level
toilets become the normal expectation for emergency response and prepositioned
supplies. Using a toilet is neither a luxury nor an option. Nor are toilets
particularly difficult to build given the right forward planning on what sort,
how it will work and whether it will meet standards for protection from
contamination, contagious diseases and invasion of privacy.

This is the sort of thinking that should be happening
in advance of a disaster situation, so that children already facing extremely
challenging health conditions can at least have a safe and sanitary place to go
to the toilet.